Hey, forgetaboutit

Who knew a trip to a supplier in New Jersey would have me singing a song from "Chicago"?
♫ Give 'em the old razzle dazzle ♫
 

I've had a recurring issue of mixed parts in shipments received from this supplier.  They aren't even parts my company buys.  I feel like opening a bag of parts from them is like opening a Cracker Jack box.  I never know what the prize inside is going to be.

I know most people like the prize in the Cracker Jack box or breakfast cereal, but these prizes are more like finding a fly in your soup...machine downtime, a wrong part on an assembly, having to listen to production complain.

I find it hard to believe that I'm their only customer that has a problem with mixed parts, if I have collected 20 of the 'collect all 50 set', certainly others have collected a few.  Yet, they tell me I'm the only one this causes a problem for.  When I bring up this problem they give me a very Jersey response of, "forget about it".  I ask how they'll fix it, they give me half a response.  Finally, I determine that I have to talk to them in person and see the place to understand what's happening.

While I was there, keeping the "I like to hear myself talk" personalities on topic proved difficult.  I ask a question, they talk about something else.  I request, "how will you fix problem A?"  They respond, "check out process B we can do".  I felt like I was watching an illusionist.  They kept trying to divert my attention to what they want to show off and just hide the flaws.  Is that why Snooki has that hair bump?

Check out how tall this hair makes me look, I'm not that chubby.
♫ How can they see with sequins in their eyes?  ♫

When I brought up valid issues, I was interrupted and stopped short, "yeah, we know all about that".  Great, then fix it! I scream inside my head, but am unable to say aloud because Jersey boy keeps talking.
♫ How can they hear the truth above the roar? ♫

Due to my inability to get a word in edgewise, I feel like they picked my pocket on a NYC subway.  "Give us your money, and we'll keep sending you whatever crap we want".

Let's just say, I was happy to return to the Midwest.  And the first thing I did was take a shower to wash the Jersey off of me  (no GTL for me).

♫ Razzle dazzle 'em, and they'll never catch wise ♫

I have an idea!

My favorite day in the 5 years I've been at my current job was 4 years ago when an engineer I respect finally became so fed up that he walked out of a meeting.

What could enrage someone so much to have them cause a scene and walk out?  The Liar.  I'm sure everyone has dealt with someone who has a belief that cannot be changed no matter how many logical arguments are made against it.

Well, today I was sitting in a meeting discussing new parts when Liar started asking questions about the new computer systems we're using.  It's annoying because this wasn't the appropriate venue to get his questions answered and I feel like it wasted everyone's time.  However, I'm glad I was there to thwart his efforts of making our processes even more convoluted than they already are.  Here is how the meeting went:

Liar: We need to review all the part numbers, SQE needs early visibility, we need part numbers during this meeting
Me: Why?
Liar: There are things we need to do in the system
Me: Right, which we won't be able to do until parts are loaded in the system which isn't until after the Wednesday meeting where part numbers are always provided
Liar:  We need early visibility
Me: Parts may change before the official release.  We get the part numbers Wednesday when they are officially released, I don't see a need for them before then

The conversation then moves elsewhere, and about 3 minutes later...
Liar: So can we get the part numbers at this meeting?

There are a few people here that are like this.  Once they get an idea in their head, they can't change it.   "I have a brilliant idea!"  No, no, really, you don't, you have an idea that will add work and gain us nothing, but for some reason you are so proud of having an idea that you can't listen to other suggestions or ideas about your original [stupid] idea.

And that is what caused the engineer to storm out of the meeting years ago.  Liar had an idea, each of the other 18 people in the room disagreed with it.  Nearly all of them presented at least one logical reason why Liar's idea was atrocious, but he wouldn't listen.  Liar's idea would have made the project more complicated and more costly and not gained anything.  While all of us tried to explain this, he wouldn't listen.  For 15 minutes the entire room argued with Liar but he refused to deviate from his original idea and belief.  This led to the engineer getting up and declaring, "in 35 years of working here I have never had to walk out of a meeting, but I can't stay here if you won't listen to reason" and he walked out the door.  I wish I had had the nerve to follow him out, or at least give him a standing ovation.

Did you get that memo?

...It's just that we're putting new coversheets on all the TPS reports.

Ok, so I haven't experienced that Office Space moment of having several people tell me the exact same thing.  That would require people at my workplace to actually communicate, something we don't do all that effectively.

What I find more aggravating than hearing the same thing from several people is redundant communication from one person.  I've joked that this one person could be replaced by a parrot.  He's very good at repeating what he hears over and over, but original thoughts from him are rare.  As I see it, the parrot would be cheaper and less likely to cause problems.

I also think keeping a parrot's cage clean would use less paper than this particular coworker. 

My favorite redundant communication from Parrot is meeting notices.  Under normal circumstances, people send you a meeting notice in Outlook, you respond and then go to the meeting when it happens.  While this works for most people, it is not good enough for Parrot.  First, you will receive an e-mail with the meeting notice.  Shortly thereafter you should expect a print out of that meting notice with your name highlighted on the attendees list. 

If you are not at your desk when he stops by with the printout, he'll leave it at your desk, but he'll still need to verbally confirm that you did indeed get the e-mail, and the printout of the e-mail.  So expect your phone to ring or for Parrot to keep stopping by until he "touches base" with you. 

Once the meeting starts you had better be there on time.  If you are a minute late, you'll probably go back to your desk to find a voicemail awaiting you.  Parrot will start dialing phone numbers as soon as the meeting was supposed to start.  He must track you down and remind you yet again that a meeting is taking place.


As you can probably tell by this post, pointless redundancy annoys me.  So I had to investigate what could cause someone to do all this extra work.  My best estimate is lack of reading comprehension.  I foolishly believed that anyone with a high school diploma or GED, let alone a college degree, should at least have basic reading comprehension skills.  Isn't reading comprehension critical for today's e-mail filled workplace?  Well, I have learned that if you send Parrot an e-mail or worse, a report, you will be asked to go over it with him. 

This is only true if your job position is below his.  He wouldn't ask his managers or an equal to sit through reading everything, but as someone lower on the totem pole, my time isn't worth anything, so I may as well sit and go over this 20 page report that he hasn't even bothered to read.  Maybe I'm making assumptions I shouldn't, but I could have sworn reports are written to be read.  That the idea behind a report is to have the information accessible to anyone at anytime, and so the author doesn't have to be present to explain everything....because it's EXPLAINED IN THE REPORT!

Lessons learned:

1. Reading comprehension may not be a skill all coworkers possess.
2. Don't waste your time writing an e-mail or report to Parrot, he will need to hear it all verbally.
3. Make sure everyone knows that you got that memo.

Lie Count

When I started working I was a naive, fresh out of college kid.  I assumed my coworkers always told the truth.  Why would anyone feel the need to lie to someone on his own team?  It seemed to me that sharing the necessary information with everyone would help the team to draw the correct conclusions and be able to help if needed.  Clearly, I knew nothing of the real world; the world of corporate politics, information hoarding, back stabbing, ladder climbing and watch your back paranoia.

I went on being naive for a couple of years.  Sure, I knew people might stretch the truth on how hard they work or how great their accomplishments are, but never would I have imagined what I have since discovered.

It only took one lie to set off my internal lie detector and leave it on permanently.  It all happened during a small meeting of just four people.  We were discussing a project one of my suppliers was working on.  That morning we had received an overly apologetic e-mail from the supplier.  I was wondering what had prompted such a response.  I had not yet contacted the supplier about the problem he was apologizing for.  I spoke to my commodity manager, she had not contacted the supplier yet.  Her manager had not contacted the supplier.  We all turned our heads to the remaining person in the room. 

"I didn't talk to the supplier", he claimed. 
"Well, I didn't, the commodity manager didn't, and yet something must have provoked this response", I stated accusingly.
I knew this person was prone to talking to my supplier behind my back, often making my job more difficult.  I had addressed that issue with him before.
He sheepishly replied, "Well....maybe I faxed them".

Faxed?  Really?

1. Who communicates via fax?  E-mail and phone are available and far more efficient
2. The overly appologetic supplier e-mail seemed to be a response from having been yelled at.  As the e-mail was not a reply to another e-mail, I'm nearly certain a phone call was made.
3. The liar would be more prone to a phone call as it leaves no record of the conversation.

I was left wondering why anyone would waste their breath on such an obvious lie.  Everyone will figure out you contacted the supplier, and if somehow this lie is not caught, what will be gained from it?  I pondered, if he would tell such an obvious lie, what else had this man spouted that was complete and total bullshit.

And so it began.  I started keeping a tally of his lies.  I heard four lies in that meeting alone.  Those were just the lies I knew to be false, things I could prove.  I'm sure there were more that went undetected.  The commodity manager and I discussed the "maybe I faxed them" lie and I told her how I was now keeping a lie count.  Soon the lie tally found its way to my whiteboard, coworkers learned of it and would tell me when to add to it from meetings they had attended with the liar.

Lies varied from big to small.  From having a huge impact on things to not even needing to be mentioned.  Some examples ended up in a file I created to help remind myself not to trust the liar, and partially as evidence for when things would go poorly.
Example lies include:

• "We could just print those here, on the color printer on the floor".  When questioned on the existence of this printer, "the color printer we use for [customer] labels".  Those labels are supplied to us.  Rather than verify his information, he fabricates supporting evidence for his original lie.
• Withheld information that a supplier had made a 4 cavity mold when a 1 cavity mold was requested.  When someone else started to share this information, he tried to stop them.  The mold being 4 cavities made the inspection report useless.
• When no progress was made on a project, something was made up so progress could be reported
• "I don't remember who said it, but they said that's how we ordered it the first time around"  Umm..this is the first time around, and you don't remember who because no one said it.

Before long half my whiteboard was covered with tally marks.

One day the liar brought a supplier to my cube with a question.  The liar asked about my whiteboard.  With the large label of 'Lie Count' there wasn't much I could say.  I told him, "I've been tracking lies.  It helps me know what to believe and act upon".
He questioned,  "Is that between all of us here  [indicating our facility]?" 
"Sure" was my one word response. 
I'm not rude enough to say "no, it's just your lies" in front of the supplier, as much as I may have wanted to. 

As the tally grew, the lie count became more and more conspicuous.  My manager asked me about it.  I explained what it was and how it helped me.  It had started as a joke and a curiosity, but I learned a lot from it.  I noticed the liar's patterns, which helped me recognize when he might be lying, despite my not having proof.  This allowed me to act accordingly.  Listening for lies even helped me pay closer attention during meetings.

My manager told me my lie count could no longer remain so public.  I wanted to ask, "could his lies stop being so public?" but didn't. And so the lie count died with over 350 distinct known lies in 5 months.  I still doubt most of what the liar says and I still hear obvious lies from him.  I recognize his back-tracking patterns and ocassionally I wonder if I'd still be naively believing the liar if he hadn't, "well...maybe faxed them".

You know what happens when you assume...

...nothing, because no one here will be held accountable.

In today's workplace it appears that hard work and a job well done are rewarded with more work.  A coworker once complained to me about "shit rolling down hill", but I believe it would be more accurately described as "shit is attracted to competence".  My one friend sometimes refers to her job as the 'pooper scooper', and sadly it seems true.  She's capable of cleaning up the mess, and so mess gets dumped on her.

It would seem corporations are organized to reward the incompetent and punish those who actually get the job done.

Organizational charts should look something like this:

In reality, most organizations look like this:

So how is it that mindless crap machines remain employed?  To put it in corporate buzz lingo, these are employees that are 'non-value add'.  Only, they are worse than that, they are drains on the company.  I'm sure you know at least one of these people.  Someone who is not just awful at their job, but that makes the jobs of others more difficult, time-consuming, stressful, and unforgiving.  Or worse, they not only create useless chaos within the company, but waste the time and money of suppliers and customers as well.

Example time!  Let's say someone in purchasing doesn't understand when he's asked to quote a change, and instead he runs off and has the supplier implement the change.  The change was only being discussed and may not have been the final solution.  Others were just looking for a cost estimate to evaluate this solution.  Here the purchasing person has created extra work for the supplier, cost his company money, and frustrated coworkers who may have been evaluating other cheaper, quicker, better solutions.

The mistakes and piles of crap created by incompetent workers intensifies over vacation periods.  For example, perhaps a competent employee takes a day off to attend a funeral.  You'd think one day off wouldn't result in too much work to catch up on, but you'd be wrong.  While that competent employee is grieving, someone with less ability is trying to cover for them and creating mountains out of mole hills. 

Not that this is something I have any experience with.  But, let's say a problem becomes well broadcast in that one day of absence and several people learn about it.  It becomes something that requires weekly meetings and ends up taking 7 months to resolve because of who became involved.  That same problem, which had an easy solution, which was implemented and working fine, could have been handled in 3 weeks with minimal pain.

Perhaps an illustration will help.  The graph below represents the size of a problem based on who is working on the problem. 

As you can see, the problem quickly becomes overgrown in the hands of the incompetent employee.  This leaves the competent employee forced to resolve the problem, but it will take him more time and effort to do so.


Vacation is similarly a problem when the incompetent employee leaves for 2 weeks with all kinds of open issues in need of resolution.  Someone else will be forced to clean up the mess, and the vacationer can return to find his problems resolved.

Actually, perhaps that is the strategy of the incompetent employees.  "I don't know how to fix this, so I'll just let it sit until someone else takes care of it".  I want to give adults more credit than that, but perhaps to do so would be foolish.  Perhaps they are acting like a child asked to do a chore.  "If I do this poorly, or wrong so mom has to do more work to fix it, then she'll never ask me to do this again!" 

Which brings us back to the question of, WHY DO THESE PEOPLE HAVE JOBS? 

How to Appear Important - Brown-nosing and Name-dropping

[Disclaimer: blah, blah, use at your own risk, written consent of major league baseball, side effects are bad, all sales final, etc.]



How to Appear Important
Method 3: Brown-nosing and Name-dropping  (aka "networking")

Have you lost all self-respect?  Are you ready to get dirty and become a mindless drone?  If you answered "yes" to either of these questions, brown-nosing and name-dropping are for you!

Step 1: Name-dropping

A great way to appear important is to let everyone know of any association between you and people who actually are important. 

Did your boss give you instructions to do something a certain way?  Great!  If anyone questions you, just tell them "My boss said it needs to be done this way".  Did your college professor tell you you're great at math?  Next time someone questions your numbers, just state, "While attending University X, professor Z told me I was his favorite student."

Name-dropping during meetings is the perfect time to appear important.  Be sure to use the name of someone not attending the meeting.  As soon as you mention during your presentation, "while I discussed this with the CEO..." your audience will be in awe.  

When using this technique, watch out for other name-droppers and potential escalation bouts.

Name-dropping can also be used as an excuse.  When questioned as to why such an idiotic action was taken, I have heard, "Well, manager J knew about it, so I had to do something". 

Step 2: Brown-nosing

When name-dropping doesn't make you feel important enough, it is time to move on to brown-nosing.  Every hero needs a sidekick, and sidekicks still get some of the fame and glory.  If you can be seen as the company president's right hand man, then you will be considered important.

There are several different strategies one can take for brown-nosing

• Compliments and flattery - "Excellent presentation, sir"  "Sir, you're looking good today" 
• Task person - do anything and everything that is asked of you. "I'll get that coffee with 1 sugar and 2 creams right away"
• Friends  - use any common bond you may have, or just take up his interests as your own.  "I saw our favorite team played really well this weekend"
• Yes man - "I agree, cutting pay and doubling the workload is a brilliant cost savings strategy"

While brown-nosing and name-dropping are for people with no self-respect, a new label of "networking" has been applied to these ideas such that workers can pretend to be dignified while sucking up.  Networking is the polite (and preferred) term for office politics. 

Whenever I hear the term "networking", I picture a spider web where once someone has met you or talked to you, you are trapped in the web and they can use you however they please.

So go out, spin your web, suck-up some, and make yourself feel and appear important.

After all, it's not what you know, it's who you know; or so I've heard.

How to Appear Important - Be Heard

[Disclaimer: 3 and a half walls assumes no responsibility for the effects of implementing "How to appear important" strategies. Side effects may include: laziness, apathy, dislike, anger, weight gain, weight loss, people talking behind your back, internet addiction, believing you should be paid to do nothing, general feelings of superiority, drowsiness. Do not operate heavy machinery while using these strategies.  Consult your physician if conditions do not improve.  Use at your own risk. Discontinue use of "How to appear important" immediately if fired. Batteries still not included. Patent pending.]


How to Appear Important
Method 2: Be Heard

If no one can hear you, do you even exist?  Not in the corporate world.  Stop quietly accomplishing your work, instead start loudly disrupting the work of others!

Step 1: Speaker Phone

Quick!  Put that handset down!  Don't waste your breath doing actual work that no one can hear.  Speaker phone can help ensure everyone in the surrounding area will hear you doing work.  All it takes is the touch of a button.

Nothing says "I'm important" like using speaker phone from your cubicle.  It has that air of pretentiousness to it. 

Next time you find yourself making a business call, use speaker phone and talk loudly.  Don't worry about the fact that you're the only one at your location on the phone call and how it would be much less disruptive if you used the handset (or a headset if you have one).  That is not the point!  The idea behind this strategy is that you want everyone around you to know you are working.  If it makes their jobs more difficult because they can't hear themselves thinking, all the better.  It will give you an extra leg up on that corporate ladder.  If your manager's desk is within earshot, be sure to use speaker phone when he is around so he can hear just how important and hard working you are.

Method 2: Ask Questions

Asking questions is not only a great way to try and stay awake during meetings, but it's a great way to draw more attention to yourself and make you feel important.  Think back to your college days and that annoying kid in the lecture who always asked questions.  You know, the kid that made everyone groan when his hand shot up.  Sure, the other students despised him, but the professor knew that student's name.  Having your name known is the first step of brown-nosing and the only way to the top of the corporate world.

So, ask questions, just about any question will do, but here are some generic examples to get you started:

"What do you mean by [something just said]?"

"How will this effect the bottom line?"

"How did you arrive at your conclusion?"

"Is this going to take much longer?  I have other things I need to do"

Method 3: Spout Random Facts

If you find asking questions too difficult because of timing issues, spouting random facts is for you.  Timing and relevance are not required! 

One example of spouting random facts that I have always enjoyed is living in the past.  I have actually heard this while visiting a plastic supplier: "when I used to work in plastics in 1980, the new technologies were [list of stuff I have never heard of and further discussion of how great it was]".  There is no way anyone will interpret that as something other than thinking you are an expert.  No one will see through your statements and think, 'he's living off of former glory and has no idea of today's reality'.  Never.

Another great way to use random facts is to bewilder and confuse your audience. 

No one will refute your statement. Your wealth of knowledge will leave others in awe.  They will ponder how what you said fits into the conversation.  If anything, they will feel like the idiot for not understanding. 

 
 
 
So remember, the squeaky wheel gets the grease.  Don't fall into the background, you want everyone at the workplace to know your name.  Everyone knows the company president's name.  Therefore, fame = importance.  So go claim yours with a loud voice.

3 and a half walls presents: How to Appear Important - Appear Overworked

All this week 3 and a half walls will be featuring easy ways to make yourself appear important.  All of these techniques can be learned and implemented by anyone in nearly no time at all.  Normally a book or seminar on these techniques would cost you $19.99!  I am here to give you this advice for FREE!

[Disclaimer:  3 and a half walls assumes no responsibility for the effects of implementing "How to appear important" strategies.  Side effects may include: laziness, apathy, dislike from others, people talking behind your back, internet addiction, believing you should be paid to do nothing and other general feelings of superiority.  Use at your own risk.  Discontinue use of "How to appear important" immediately if fired.  Batteries not included.  Patent pending.]

How to Appear Important

Method 1:  Always appear overworked

The brilliance behind this method is that you don't actually have to be overworked to pretend you are. 

Step 1:  Keep your desk cluttered

Clutter is great for looking busy.  "I have all this stuff on my desk because I'm in the middle of several projects.  I am very busy and important."  I like to keep parts on my desk, several stacks of paper, guides, catalogs, and other reference materials.  And boxes, boxes are great.  I have one I use for a footstool, and to appear important. 

If your company has rules regarding keeping your desk in order, it is a great opportunity to explain to your boss how you are too busy to keep your desk clean.  Try and find a balance between clutter and chaos.  Chaos will only lead to losing things and people commenting on your mess.

Step 2:  Procrastinate

Procrastination always gets a bad name, but I'm here to tell you how procrastination can help you look busy.  Say you have 4 things to do at work and you could finish them in the current workday.  Don't!  This way when someone asks you what you're working on, you can spout off a list of stuff that you "haven't had time to get around to yet".

Be sure to memorize this line: "It's not my top priority right now".  Now, when someone asks why you haven't done something, you will always have a perfect response.

Please note, anything with a deadline or that people are sure to ask about should be accomplished in a timely fashion.  Only apply this technique to those stupid little tasks that if you wait 2 months to do no one will notice or care.

Step 3: Meetings - better late or never

No, that's not a typo.  It is better to be late or just not attend meetings than actually show up on time.  First off, do you really want to sit through that boring meeting anyway?  No, you don't!  You'd rather play online.  Of course when someone asks why you missed the meeting, tell them about how busy you are, you just couldn't get away from whatever you were doing.

Showing up late to a meeting is a great way to draw attention to yourself.  By showing up late, and preferably out of breath from running to try and make it on time, you can show all the attendees how important you are because you couldn't make it there on time.

Step 4: "Working" overtime

Working extra hours is a great way to show how overworked you are, but do you really want to work extra hours?  Of course not! 

To implement this step you must first figure out if your boss is the arrive early or stay late type.  If he is the arrive early type, then you need to arrive early too.  Bring your breakfast and maybe a book in with you in the morning.  Get in early and hide in your cubicle.  Take a nap if you wish.  It's usually nice and quiet in the morning before all those annoying coworkers show up.  If your boss is a stay late type, then you need to be as well.  The quiet afternoon/evening hours are great for a game of cards on the computer, or perhaps printing off coupons for the shopping you need to do after work.

I know no one wants to stay at work longer than they have to.  I suggest taking a long lunch, or adjusting your schedule to still only 'work' 8 hours, while appearing to be at work more.  For instance, if you're staying  late to impress the boss, well then, sneak in a little late too. 



Remember, an overworked employee appears dedicated and hardworking.  Now you can have people think you are a hardworker, without the hassle of actually working hard. 

You're not as stealthy as you think you are...

In fact, you're rather obvious.  Your sneaky "printing" fools no one. 

I almost feel guilty laughing at the information hoarder's misfortune.  He has spent years gathering his knowledge base and rarely sharing it.  In this way, he ensures he will always be important.  This strategy is even more brilliant when it can be used to attend meetings others in your department do not go to.  "Well, I've been in meetings all day working on project X.  It's very time consuming and important."

Unfortunately for information hoarder, that knowledge base he worked so hard to build will soon be made obsolete by something new.

Information hoarder has not been assigned to the new project.  This aggravates him and his ire becomes more apparent each day.  It started with comments during department meetings, "I wasn't at that meeting.  How would they know how to handle x?  Did they think about y?"  Now it has evolved into 'stealth printing'. 

The main person from our department working on the new information is located near a printer.  When information hoarder hears her talking to anyone about the new information, he decides he needs to hear it.  However, his desk is too far away to get a good listen.  His solution?  Lumber over here and pretend to check the printer for something.  He must believe this is a genius plan, that no one will suspect that he's listening in.  Only one problem; it's incredibly obvious. 

Reasons why information hoarder does not go undetected:

1. There's a printer right next to his cube
2. He only comes over when the new information is being discussed
3. He lingers far longer than anyone printing something would need to
4. I sit directly across from the printer and have never seen him take anything
5. We all know he is upset over not being more involved with this project
6. Everytime he does this, a coworker notices and points it out to others.

So, Mr. Stealth Printer, I suggest you stop pretending and instead join the conversation.  Or, at the very least, come up with a better strategy for snooping. 

Time to hone those ninja skills.

The spiraling toilet of despair

I hate to admit that I have been at my job for 5 years, because it reminds me of just how apathetic I am towards my career.

5 years.  That puts me spiraling towards the crap in the middle of the toilet of despair.

A co-worker once encouraged me to, "get out while you still can!"  We then spent the next half hour drawing on my white board just how sucked into this place different employees are.  At that time I was still fresh out of college and just needed to gain experience and then escape to greener ($) pastures.  I was maybe 1/3 of the way to the interior of the toilet bowl.  My co-worker spent his time studying for the nursing classes he was taking.  He was near the outer rim of the toilet bowl with an escape route clearly in his sight.

Now is probably where I should explain that the company I work for is static.  The world around us changes, but we do not.  I think 80% of the people working here have been doing so for 20+ years.  There is no room to climb the ranks because the ranks are never vacated.  While occasional new hires exist, they leave for better offers quickly and no action is taken to retain young talent.  In my department alone (a department of 9 people currently) in the 5 years I've been here, there have been 7 engineers under the age of 30 who have left for better jobs. 

I should add to that statistic, but instead I'm treading water closer to the middle of that putrid toilet, with escape appearing more difficult thanks to the economy, a house, and an increase in apathy.

I have found it too easy to go through the motions, collect a paycheck, and die a little each day from the monotony of this place.